May 29, 2016

To me, those old ads look primitive, emotional, and evocative in a way that's more like what Trump is putting up against Hillary, but maybe that's Politico's point. Hillary needs to reach down past reason and scare the bejeezus out of people.

Here's the Trump ad that I think most resembles the old LBJ ad with the daisy:

Here's the LBJ ad:

From the Politico article:

Sid: Instead of having Hillary just stand in front of the camera as a talking head, they should do what we did — really, just illustrate what Goldwater said. When he said the United States would be better off if we sawed off the Eastern Seaboard and let it float out to sea, we just illustrated that and showed how ridiculous that was. We had a hand come out of the water and saw off the Eastern Seaboard, which just crunches off and flows out. The image was so ridiculous that it just showed how ridiculous his thinking was.

31 comments:

Repeating what LBJ's people did in 1963 would be a mistake because it was original then but would not seem so today.

The DNC's problem is that they've managed to foist a candidate worse than LBJ. I have said all along that if they take away Hillary's promise of a third Obama term, Trump melts away. But that isn't going to happen.

The irony is that Hillary was for Goldwater in '64. The Bernie supporters will be able to smell that. Hillary's only chance is to turn against her own party elite like Trump did. But that isn't going to happen either.

Fascinating article. They're going to show a video of all the times Trump switched what he says? Huh. Nowhere in the article does anyone acknowledge, or even notice, that Clinton has all the same issues and worse. Trump might start a war!! - Clinton already did, several times.

I thought Goldwater was a terrible candidate and, to my lasting regret, I voted for Johnson in 1964. That's the only time I have voted for a Democrat for president. The "Daisy Ad' was only shown once and the MSM perpetuated it. Trump will play the media as well as the Johnson people did.

We elected someone who is anti-American, an enemy of our country, raised by his family to hate us, who told us that he wanted to transform America while campaigning in 2008 which he obviously has done and the dim Dems are expected to have the bejeezus scared out of them by the America loving Trump. Obama, a man who started and is his ending term by apologizing for our country. Hillary is a loser and it will take more than "bejeezus" to get her elected.

These guys are living in the past and wasting a ton of money. People today don't watch television ads if they can help it. Unlike the old days when you were forced to endure the advertisements or just get up and leave the room we don't have to watch.

With DVRs you can fast forward through the ads by pausing the program for a bit, pre record the program. Even if you are forced to endure the ads you can instantly mute the sound without having to get up and go to the television. Streaming content with NO advertising is rapidly replacing live/real time programing.

The internet is where most people, especially younger generations, get their information. Internet ads can even be blocked by using a simple free program.

Trump is not using the old methods of hiring expensive ad executives to create expensive television spots. He is getting free advertising or what Manafort called 'earned media'. Creating youtube videos that then go viral. Tweeting and using the new media.

This is why Hillary's team and Hillary herself are flailing. They are playing a game with the old rules. Trump is using the new rules. They can't figure out HOW to change. Like dinosaurs, doomed to failure.

I would encourage Dems to go all LBJ on this. The parallels are helpful. Johnson was a congenital liar, so is Hillary! Johnson "argued" Goldwater might start a war but escalated one himself-- ditto for Hill and Trump. Johnson used blatantly transparent propaganda and Goldwater had no response -- but, oops, Trump dishes it out better than any con.

I'm just worried about an assassination attempt on Trump. The looney tunes at his rallies (outside, not inside) are crazy enough to do something. I understand he wears a bulletproof vest but several Mexican presidential candidates have been assassinated.

I expect that Trump has had Secret Service protection for awhile. Probably at least since Cruz and Kasich bowed out, and esp since he hit the magic number last week. Also presumably getting national security briefings. Hinkley got through the SS. But I doubt that it is that easy these days. No doubt, Trump has his own security too - at his level, probably has had it for quite awhile. Still, I would go with the SS.

I do wonder though how much of his family has SS protection. Maybe his wife, but she mostly seems to travel with him. All those kids buzzing around? Chelsea seems mostly to be doing the motherhood thing these days, so doesn't seem to be buzzing around that much. For non-political reasons, I would think that Chelsea's husband and Sander's wife would be the most likely non-politician targets (he for his Greek fund, losing 90% of the money invested, she for financially destroying the college she ran).

The extreme polarization of the country makes the LBJ ad strategy a non-starter. Sawing off the Eastern Seaboard doesn't sound extreme to a great deal of the country. Neither does deporting illegals or vetting Muzzies. I'd be very surprised if the Clinton people can find an effective line of attack against Trump. They don't understand him and they really, really don't understand the reasons for his popularity.

Thankfully LBJ never used nuclear bombs but he still managed to kill a lot of Asians and Americans with conventional weapons. I was too young to vote in '64, (when LBJ campaigned as the antiwar candidate) but I wasn't too young to go to Vietnam three years later.

Trump will run ridiculous emotional ads because those are all he needs. Voters who have their brains in gear already know that while Trump is a huge unknown and therefore a risky candidate, Hillary is the most blatantly corrupt and criminal candidate we've had since Aaron Burr. (And Burr's daughter looked a hell of a lot better than Hillary's.) So: vote for the risk, or vote for the guaranteed disaster. Not hard at all.

It's worse than that, though. To the Clinton crime family, getting into the White House isn't just an opportunity to abscond with the White House furniture they didn't steal last time. The Oval Office is safety and protection. Their crimes have been front page news for a year now, and things are getting even tighter; there's serious danger that the FBI is following the Clinton Foundation's international criminal dealings, due to Hillary's disastrous failure to destroy the evidence of her e-mails. And nothing the Clintons have done has been able to call off the dogs; their traditional allies, the press, the extraordinarily docile GOPe, and the PC squads are all helpless when they face off against Hurricane Donald. The Clintons must have the protection which can only be given by the Presidential office, or die in prison. I expect that they'll try to add Trump to that long list of dead bodies which have followed them since the Arkansas days. But I don't think they'll succeed; when it comes down to it, the Clintons aren't terribly good at anything.

So what Hillary should do is illustrate a wall constructed on the border between Mexico and the United States. People will see how ridiculous that is and vote for Hillary?

An imaginary Hillary could stand next to an imaginary Trump Wall and exclaim: "Mr. Trump: Tear this wall down!" She couldn't do this without creating the biggest open borders sound bite ever -- an unforced error on her part.